Barnes, Blincoe and Bethune looking strong for Round 2

Cooper Barnes, Zach Blincoe and Josh Bethune all look strong for the second round of the Bridgestone GR86 Championship this weekend at Hampton Downs Motorsport Park after each topped one of today’s three practice sessions.

Australian young gun Barnes clocked the fastest time in the morning session – notable for just how close the 26-car field was around the long 3.8km track.

The top 24 were covered by under a second meaning any kind of mistake whatsoever on a good lap would have serious consequences in the closely-knit field.

It also meant the top runners were covered by even smaller fractions of seconds.  Just one tenth of a second covered the next five runners after Barnes – Taupo race winner Emerson Vincent sitting ahead of Josh Bethune, Thomas Mallard, Zach Blincoe and Chris White. 

Hugo Allan, championship leader and the quickest driver from Thursday testing, didn’t quite have it all his own way but still posted a time good enough for seventh place.

Jett Murray, Arthur Broughan were next up while Australian Lachlan Evennett – who turned heads with a solid opening day on Thursday on his first acquaintance with the category – was tenth.

Evennett went even better in the second session, putting together a fine lap which saw him go second on the timesheets behind Zach Blincoe, another rising star from New Zealand’s ranks.

Murray and Barnes were next up, confirming they have form ahead of the weekend’s qualifying and race action. Hayden Lines was next up in fifth ahead of the first Master class runner John Penny with Allan just a fraction behind in seventh. Hayden Bakkerus – a race winner at the first round in November – Cameron Hill and Harry Townshend were next up.

Bethune gave notice that a strong weekend is on the way with the fastest time in the third session of the day, topping the timesheets by just seven one hundredths of a second after another session when the entire field was covered by just 1.2 seconds, a remarkable statistic given the 3.8km length of the Hampton Downs international layout.

Evennett concluded his day with another impressive run to the third fastest time ahead of Vincent and Arthur Broughan in fifth. Interestingly, as he had the previous day, Hugo Allan chose to sit out the session.